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Jan 6, 24
Filed under: Action, Housing, Northeast
Report on recent rent strike and launch of tenant union in so-called Connecticut. Originally posted to Cargill Tenants Union.
On December 29, 2022, tenants at 52-58 Pomfret Street (“The Lofts at Cargill Falls Mill”) received a letter from the Northeast District Department of Health (NDDH) detailing toxic levels of lead in a family’s apartment. Their two-year-old child had been severely lead poisoned. Parents in the buildings with children under the age of six were told to schedule lead inspections and blood tests for lead levels. On January 3, 2023 (after a long holiday weekend), tenants began requesting lead inspections from the NDDH.
As tenants received lead inspection results, it became clear there was widespread toxic conditions in this recently-redeveloped Brownfield site. At least six units had confirmed toxic lead levels in dust and/or exposed paint—since then at least 70 more units and almost all the common areas have been found to be toxic with lead. Konover Residential, the management company, had failed to provide a single tenant with federally-mandated EPA lead safety pamphlets, or disclose lead in any lease documents—a violation of federal law and tenants’ rights.
By the end of January 2023, a majority of tenants organized as the Cargill Tenants Union–we met to discuss the public health emergency and a supermajority signed the union membership petition. We gathered organizing support from across the state and country with: Connecticut Tenants Union, Connecticut DSA, the Autonomous Tenant Union Network, Science for the People, CT Fair Housing, and other tenant unions. We taught ourselves our legal rights and organizational potential as tenants, and started to build community amongst ourselves.
Rent Strike: February through August 2023
As we talked with our neighbors and visited each other’s apartments, we uncovered more chronic issues. Fleas, mice, verbal abuse by the property manager, cracking and improperly constructed drywall, crumbling bricks and masonry, water-damaged load-bearing wood, moisture and leaking, and vast, vast amounts of black and other molds. It has been open for less than four years.
Due to the extreme dangers present, and our landlord’s refusal to communicate, CTU members went on rent strike. From February to August 2023, we followed Connecticut’s legal process of paying rent into escrow accounts under the local Housing Authority. A growing number of tenants paid their rent into the housing court until apartments with children received lead abatement. We also served a demand letter to both Konover Residential and the property owner, Historic Cargill Falls LLC (sole member: Leanne Parker). Our demands at that time included: comprehensive lead and mold inspections throughout the complex, swift abatement of hazards, proper maintenance staffing, and inspections/repairs to major structural damage in the mill.
Even though the Putnam housing court ended up dismissing the majority of cases, our members won and enforced: a year-long rent freeze (to be continued into 2024), comprehensive lead inspections paid for by the CTDOH, air quality inspections, mold and lead abatement, and renewal of leases for vulnerable tenants.
Read more about our early organizing and case details in the CT Mirror.
They Want Us Out, But We Won’t Go!
In November 2023, after a year of management and ownership dragging their feet, tenants received the results of union-won lead inspections. 68/71 tested apartments had toxic lead levels, and almost all common areas as well–despite having received abatement only several months before. This led the CTU Organizing Committee (CTU OC) to renew our commitment to our union: we knocked every door no less than three times over the holidays to share health and hazard information on lead that management, the NDDH, and the town all have continuously failed to provide themselves.
Mismanagement led to the mass passive eviction of tenants of the mill throughout 2023, and now we find ourselves in half-empty buildings. How is a major “affordable housing” redevelopment project rotting away while homelessness in Connecticut increases?
We are preparing to escalate direct action against our landlord, management company, and public agencies, until we are living in safe and stable housing. Tenants have the right to determine the conditions in which we live, and to democratically control our living space. Shelter is a human right, and that right has been repeatedly violated by municipalities that aid and abet developer control.
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